


Scar Tissue

by beederiffic



Series: Jagged Little Pill [2]
Category: James Bond (Movies), Skyfall (2012) - Fandom
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Explicit Sexual Content, M/M, Rimming, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-23
Updated: 2012-11-23
Packaged: 2017-11-19 08:27:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/571222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beederiffic/pseuds/beederiffic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Q's too much of a welcome distraction</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scar Tissue

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: spoilers for Skyfall
> 
> Sequel to [Jagged Little Pill](http://archiveofourown.org/works/559481). This reads as reasonably complete (if angsty), but there will be a couple more chapters to round off a storyline that I've got going on in my head here.

“Good evening, 007.”

The surprise when he opens the carriage door and sees Q sitting there, bundled up in an arctic-weight coat, is a physical shock, and Bond feels his heartbeat spike before he lowers his firearm. “This is an unexpected pleasure. What brings you out here?”

Q waits for him to holster the PPK, then hands him a small device, all the while giving him a level, pissy look that makes Bond want to put him over his knee and teach him some manners. 

“Apparently we're not allowed to courier these things and I have to deliver them in person, even if it means a trip to the arctic circle. Careful – it's currently unarmed, but if you drop it, the last you see of your legs might be them flying in opposite directions over your shoulders.”

“Some kind of grenade?” It's a tidy little thing, disguised as a digital camera. 

“A modified flash-bang suitable for creating a lasting distraction and a point of access. Arm it by depressing the shutter button for a count of three, then make yourself scarce within a count of ten.” Deft fingers delicately turn it over in his palm, pointing out the flat, heavier bump in the back that could be a battery pack. “This packs enough explosive power to punch through several layers of reinforced concrete. In addition, detonation activates a sonic pulse that'll temporarily deafen and confuse all bystanders, so you'll want to use these earplugs beforehand. They pop out of this compartment.”

“You've certainly got over your aversion to blowing stuff up.” 

Bond shrugs out of his jacket and winces as he pulls his blood-caked shirt away from the scratch tracing the line of his belt around a third of his waist. The slip-wire might've saved his life, but it had a damn good try at cutting him in half while it was at it. From the corner of his eye, he can see Q's eyes widening behind his glasses, that wide, expressive mouth betraying his concern for the split second it takes him to get himself under control. 

“Yes, well. Call it youthful idealism but I took this role in the understanding that modern espionage was slowly dragging itself into the twenty-first century. I'll admit I hadn't factored in the drag factor of existing systems.” Q takes the camera grenade back and clips in into a secure carry case, handing it back over to Bond in that neat, to-the-point way he has about him. “This represents an eighth of my quarterly budget, so, no, you can't have another one. Make it . . . count.”

The barely-noticeable pause occurs when Bond stows his holster then finishes unbuttoning his shirt to pull it off, and Q's doing his absolute best not to stare at Bond's chest as a faint flush starts to colour his broad, high cheekbones. They might be up here, racing towards the lair of a madman in the furthest corner of what passes for civilisation this far north, with the air outside dropping below minus-twenty now night's falling, but at least a flash of his skin's enough to warm the blood of the infuriating git of a quartermaster Bond hasn't been able to put out of his mind as entirely as he should've.

“Are you planning to get that professionally seen to before you take on Vincenzo?”

“The tape'll hold it.” Bond tears off the metre-long strip of duck tape he's unspooled and begins to strap it around the worst of the torn skin. “It's not deep, just bloody.”

He forces his mouth not to smile, not even to twitch, at how Q's getting increasingly fidgety with the frustration of keeping his too-smart mouth shut for once, lest he betray that he actually gives a shit about Bond's physical state. So Bond continues to calmly and methodically strap up the cut, tearing off each strip with his teeth before patting it into place. He could almost count off the seconds before Q makes an exasperated tut and gives in.

“This is ludicrous. Shouldn't you at least wash the blood off first?”

“Best to leave it. The blood's cleaned it out and I don't want to introduce any more fresh bacteria than I have to.” He presses the last of the tape into place and manages not to wince when his fingers find a tender spot that'll have a bruise the size of Norway surrounding it in an hour or two. “This may surprise you, but I have had some experience with wound care.”

It's the wrong thing to have said, or the wrong tone. Q stiffens like a disapproving cat, then rises from where he's been sitting in the one small seat the room provides. “Of course you have. And I have a flight to catch, so I'll see you back in London.”

“Will you?” Bond barely has to take one step towards Q to start crowding him back against the small wall cupboard. He stands close enough that the zip on Q's coat is grazing his ribs, close enough to watch Q's throat bob on a swallow, close enough to look into the smoke-blue sunset of the eyes behind the glasses growing darker with arousal. “You're sure about that?”

“We're not in my flat. This is work.”

“This is a sleeper, and there's a bed less than a foot away.”

 _I might not come back. Not from this one._ He could say it, because they're both thinking it, and God knows he's accustomed to using whatever weapons are at hand. Or he could say that he's scared of what's to come, because he is. It isn't the first time and won't be the last, and he'll put it to one side when the time comes so it won't get in his way, but a diversion from it in the form of the man standing millimetres away, mouth an inch from his, is an opportunity he can't ignore. He moves forward, Q speaking against his lips as he goes in for a kiss.

“My stop's coming up in fifteen minutes.”

Bond means to be casual, to be as detached as his reputation would suggest he is, but when he murmurs “Then let's make the most of each one of them” into his quartermaster's mouth, it's got a horrible lovesick resonance to it that chills him more effectively than the snow rushing by outside the small window.

The rhythmic _da-da-da-daa, da-da-da-daa_ of the train's wheels travelling along its tracks accompanies their struggle out of Q's coat. Q's sucking Bond's tongue into his mouth and clinging to his ears as Bond makes neat work of their trousers, pushing them down to their knees before shoving his hand into the back of Q's pants to seize a palm of bum cheek. As always, kissing Q's like handling a bag of live snakes, something that needs to be dealt with forcefully but with respect for what a sharp set of teeth is capable of. His arse is a perfect handful, the only plump bit of flesh on a body so slender it looks like it's been drawn in pencil, beautifully so, in spare lines with occasional, surprising curves or dips. 

Bond can't stop thinking about it. How it looks in the grey dawn coming in under the curtains early morning, how the bathroom light shines off its flat planes and defined structure during a cramped, shared shower. How it's the ideal combination of awkward grace and strength, whippet thin but luxuriously so. He can't stop thinking about it, or its owner. He needs to stop. Every time is definitely the last, until he makes it happen again.

“I'm not going to be able to climb up onto the bed with my pants around my ankles without headbutting a wall.”

“Here. Let me.” 

He lifts Q against him clumsily, attempting to turn them both around in the cramped space. Q's heavier than he looks, much heavier, and what's almost certainly a cracked rib complains as the train's movement sways, throwing him off balance, which then wrenches his back. It reminds Bond of how he's probably only a few years off being too damn old for this job, if he makes it that long, every injury taking longer to heal, his energy frequently dipping where he had once been able to run flat-out for as long as it took. Everything hurts. He's tired, sore and scared, and wants to fall into bed to bury himself in this beautifully lithe boy until stuff starts to hurt less, or at least matter less. But even the falling-into-bed bit's becoming harder to accomplish these days.

“I don't think this thing's built for multiple occupancy.” 

“Don't be such a fucking pessimist.” Q's biting at his bottom lip, trying to roll over, and take Bond over with and onto him, inside the tiny sleeper cubicle. “Get your pants down, I can't reach . . .”

A few seconds' more of elbows and knees, and grunts of frustration, one or two curses thrown in, and he's lying against Q. The room's dim light sends shadows across the face beneath his, shading the eyes looking up at him, which close with his first thrust against Q's cock. Bond noses into Q's neck, biting and sucking at the skin above Q's collar and behind his ear, shoving his hand underneath their rutting hips to grab at Q's arse again. He can't get as close as he needs to. He can't cover himself with the smell of him like he wants to, or draw inside of him the feeling of all that strength and obstinacy condensed into this one slender body. Q's gasping and moaning, directing Bond's hips with his hands and sounding like rubbing against each other like this is nearly enough.

Bond looks down at the long length of pale neck stretched out against his mouth, his prick growing harder and his pre-cum smearing between them both as he gets closer, his arsehole tightening, his thighs starting to quake. Q opens his eyes on a groan of approaching climax, nuzzling his nose and mouth over Bond's face in such a primal gesture that Bond feels his eyes smart, and he pushes his tongue into Q's open mouth in the same way he wants to fuck into Q's body, or have Q fuck into his, or whatever else it'll take to scratch this fucking itch once and for all.

He's going to come. Shit, he's going to come hard. “Oh, fuck.”

Q grabs his bum, kneading strong fingers into his arse cheek. “Are you going to come over my cock? How close are you? I'm almost there.”

Bond grits his teeth and tries to hold back, because it's always easier for the other person to climax first, meaning he then won't have anything to do other than relax and make complementary small talk once he's post-coital himself. But then Q starts to tug at his earlobe with his teeth, warm breath filling his ear and sending shivers down his neck which add to the spiralling intensity of his oncoming orgasm, and now the one thing that demonstrates he's made this happen too many times, pushes him over the lip of the infinite drop . . .

Q threads a hand through the sliver of space between them and demonstrates how he knows Bond's body far better than he should. His deft fingers skate through Bond's pubic hair, diving down in between his thighs to scratch along the side of his nutsack, where a faded surgery scar runs in almost a perfect circle. It undoes Bond completely and, with a shudder that's more of a convulsion, he starts to come while he clenches his teeth so hard it feels like they might shatter.

He figures out that Q's come too from the wet gasp into his ear, the quivers running through the body against him, along with the liquid warmth of more cum than he's capable of producing alone coating his belly and softening dick. 

“Look at that. I've only used up ten minutes of your valuable time.”

His arm feels like it's made of lead as he lifts it to show Q his watch. Q narrows his eyes through his glasses to look at it, his kiss-red lips hanging open as he gets his breath back. “At least I've got a few minutes to clean up. Christ, I'm more spunk-covered than a choirboy's chin.”

It makes Bond chuckle into Q's shoulder, and he rests his forehead against Q's shoulder briefly, closing his eyes, grateful to the one person left alive who seems to be able to make him laugh. Q hugs him back, pressing his mouth in a kiss under Bond's jaw, before he pushes against Bond's chest with both hands. “Alright, that's enough, fuck off. I've got to start wiping things down or else I'm going to have to sit through an entire flight stinking of rent boy.”

As he rolls away, letting Q squirm out of the sleeper, all the aches and pains hit Bond again, the graze under the tape stinging and throbbing, his ribs nagging at him for daring to do anything other than lie flat until fully recovered. If he felt over-the-hill earlier, he feels totally past it now, as much of a dried-out husk as something discovered deep inside an old tomb, but the warm-honey contentment of his orgasm along with watching Q frowning in concentration as he tries to clean all the jizz out of his sizable bush with wadded tissue, makes him not care too much. Not right now.

“Right, then. I suppose this is 'bye for now. Good luck with Vincenzo, 007.” 

He's tried once to get Q to call him by name, but this is how it is between them, and it doesn't show any sign of changing. Q is Q and Bond's 007, even if he's knuckle-deep inside Q's arsehole with a cock coming across his tongue. 

“Thanks.” Bond's too tired, his ribs too sore, to do anything other than scrub himself down with the thin sheet, making sure he cleans the tape off so it doesn't get too wet and start to peel. “I appreciate Q Branch coming out here to provide . . .” He lets his eyes dip to where Q's zipping up his trousers, “such timely support.”

Now Q's the one trying not to smile, wide mouth pressed into a firm line, and James wants nothing more than to lean out of the bunk to hook a fingertip into the dark curl dipping across Q's eyes, to tuck it back behind his ear, and then to pull him back into the bed they won't fit in to tell him to miss his flight. Maybe they could stay on the train, wrapped around each other, letting it carry them past his stop.

“Remember – a count of ten. Don't lose your head.”

The door closes behind Q's slim shoulder, so he stares at the wooden ceiling of the sleeper cubicle, and says it to himself. “I won't. Never do.”

~*~

“You're late.”

“Only by four days.”

“His nibs was expecting you back on the Monday flight.” Moneypenny leans forward to smack Bond's hip off her desk where he's perched and examining the contents of her pen pot. “Having a grumpy boss makes me grumpy. And, to paraphrase another muscle-bound lunkhead, you wouldn't like me when I'm grumpy.”

“What are you going to do – shoot me again?”

“I'm going to ask you to get that delicious arse of yours in there,” She snatches the nail file off him where he's smoothing off a snag in his thumbnail, “and perhaps not act like you're doing everyone a favour by showing up at all.”

“You want me to lie? I'm appalled.” 

He lets her wave him off her desk, crossing to the inter-office door just as her intercom beeps, M's voice coming across loud and clear. 

_“I'd like to have a word or two, 007, if you've quite finished irritating my staff . . .”_

“On my way, sir.” He looks deeply into Moneypenny's eyes, leaning in towards her until they're within kissing distance. “Dinner later? There must be something you need shaving in reimbursement by now.”

But he knows she's going to say no, and considers what he'd do if, against all expectation, she actually takes him up on it. She doesn't. She leans back in her chair and starts on her own nails. “I can't. I'm letting a very nice man who owns a gallery take me out and, besides, I wax. For all the impact it apparently has . . .”

_“Riveting though this is, Ms. Moneypenny, I do have that meeting with the Minister of Defence to get to.”_

“Of course, sir.” To her credit, Moneypenny doesn't turn a hair. She reaches under her desk to press a button, and the inter-office door clicks, popping open by a centimetre. “Off you trot.”

Mallory's leaning back in his desk chair reading through a file, not taking his eyes from it as Bond enters his office and sits. “007. Glad you could make it.”

“Thank you, sir. Glad to be back.” He can't think of Mallory as M. Not yet. 

“Yes, I imagine you are.” 

Mallory finally lowers the file to give him a wintery smile, and again Bond gets the impression that he'll never be certain Mallory's a hundred percent on the same page as him. It wasn't like that with M. With _Mawdsley_ , he mentally corrects himself. No matter how much she quacked at him in annoyance, an owner bringing a recalcitrant dog to heel, or however much they disagreed on his methods, he'd seldom doubted they'd shared the same core goals. It's a certainty he finds he's missing more than he'd previously thought.

“A four-day delay? I suppose you have a reasonable explanation.”

“I had to get her home.”

“Had to?” Mallory places the file down on his desk and looks at Bond, just looks at him for a good ten seconds before speaking again. “Interesting choice of words. Your hand was forced?”

“By common decency, if nothing else.” 

“Which is unquestionably what your reputation leads us to believe is your sole motivation.”

Bond's losing patience with this. An umbilical cord of awareness is tugging him towards Q's office and, although he knows he should deal with this then check in with the medical department before heading off for a few days of boredom and recuperation, he knows beyond a doubt that Armoury's his next stop. He breaks the staring contest this new M's been having with him, taking a look around the office instead. “I'm sorry to have to ask this, sir . . .”

“Go on.”

It goes against all his training, but his mood forces it out of him as he looks back into Mallory's face and sees all the chilly emptiness of Q's creepy little lizard friend looking back at him. “Is this conversation coming to a point any time soon, or should I sit?”

He'd never have got away with that with M. With _Mawdsley_. Mallory barely blinks.

“The point is, 007, that our resources are not what they once were, and that I'm not paying for you to go off on some four-day jaunt with a Polish waitress.”

“Who played a vital part in bringing down Vincenzo's processing plant, and who'd have been taken out by his organisation in a second if I'd left her in the country.”

“You sought to protect her by taking her back to her family?”

“Yes, I did.”

“It didn't work.” 

Mallory flips open the file he'd been reading moments before, and pushes across his desk towards Bond. The photo inside makes him feel as if his lungs have been cut off from his mouth. 

“You've been warned before about making these decisions alone. Now, believe me, I understand that when you're in the field it can seem as if you're entirely alone and that these things are your sole remit and responsibility. But that's not the case, 007. There's an entire infrastructure behind you that you're determined not to engage with, which will not be tolerated any longer. And don't bother turning in an expenses claim on this one. It won't be approved if you do. Have I made myself clear?” 

He's never wanted to punch anyone in the face as much as he does right now. His knuckles are split and swollen from taking on Vincenzo's thugs a few days back, but he'd happily bust each one of them open on Mallory's nose. “Yes, sir. Very good, sir.”

“I'm glad we understand each other. You're dismissed. Report back in a week.”

 _“Thank you, sir.”_ It's the only acceptable response he should give. Instead he manages a tight nod, then turns and exits the room before his control breaks catastrophically. 

“Did you take your spanking like a big boy?” Eve doesn't know. He can tell by the way her eyes are lifted at the corners that her smile's genuine and that she has no idea what happened to Marta. 

“That wasn't a spanking. That was more of a colonic.”

She gets up off where she's been sitting on top of her desk waiting for him, and she untucks his tie, beginning to straighten it. “So you're all clean inside and out. Lovely.”

“You're sure I can't lure you out for a drink? The very nice gallery owner sounds deathly.”

“Better deathly than deadly.” She runs her thumb over where the scab in his eyebrow's starting to peel. “I'm sure. Go let them bolt you back together.”

 

~*~

 

“Oh, it's you, 007. Good morning.”

Bond had known it was likely Q already knew about Marta. Q might look like the delicate, soulful fifth-former half the upper sixth are in love with, but he's actually one of the fifty most powerful people in the country, whether he seems to realise it or not. And the way Q pitches his greeting perfectly, in bland good manners with the smallest hint of whatever-we-were-only-fucking-anyway colouring his words, it's clear to Bond that Q knows exactly where he's been over the past four days, and that he has a good idea what, and who, he's been doing. 

“Hullo. I brought you a present.”

“So long as it's not another tooth . . .”

Q's wearing that sod-awful cardigan again, and his neck's too long above his white collar as he turns to his work station to close something out, the _chiaroscuro_ of the contrast between his pale skin and the dark hair growing into the nape of his neck highlighting his gawky elegance. That nagging familiarity tugs at Bond's conscience again, but he doesn't give into it because, no matter the similarities between Q and Vesper, both of them dark, slim, strong, too quick and far too terminally unimpressed by him, this is not a matter of him trying to replace something that's lost. This is something far worse, and so far he's not been able to screw it out of his system with somebody else. Not for want of trying.

“I thought you might like this.” It's the handle of a mug, unbroken and incongruously welded to a building rivet. “The heat of the blast from your flash-bang took out one of the guard units. They must've been on a tea break.”

“Huh, look at that. It gives a rather new perspective to 'One for the pot' . . .”

Usually it would've made him smile, but he's unsure of Q's current disposition so instead he unholsters the PPK, laying it on the desk and watching as Q efficiently disengages the magazine, casually placing it and the weapon in an out-tray as if they're an internal memo. Then Q holds out his hand expectantly, and Bond hands over the small radio unit that accompanies him on every operation, placing it into the centre of Q's palm.

“You're returning both items?” Q raises both his eyebrows in mock surprise when Bond pulls the used earplugs out of his jacket pocket to hand him. “Blimey, those as well, and a gift, too. _Now_ it's Christmas.”

“Then where's the mistletoe?”

It's too flip, too trite. Q's as unmoving as a photograph, the lenses in his glasses reflecting a warped view of whatever he's suddenly looking at on his monitor. “I hear it grows beautifully in Warsaw this time of year. And I won't keep you, 007, but thanks for reporting in and returning –”

“She's dead. They killed her.” 

Q's fringe falls over his forehead as he starts working once more and keeps his eyes fixed on his computer, but Bond senses his hesitation in the way a breath catches between Q's lips. He moves closer, enough that his shoulder's touching Q's, and inches towards Q's ear to state it more softly. “Marta's dead. You didn't hear it from upstairs?”

A single shake of the head, and Q looks at him, one side of his face highlighted with the glow coming from his computer screen. “No. I, um . . . I'm sorry.”

Bond shrugs and mutters “It's okay”, and all of a sudden he feels terribly sad, for Marta and some small amount for himself. He knows enough about himself to be certain that his expression won't be giving it away. He hasn't moved, and his voice was firm, because he's had more practice with ruthlessly repressing emotional response than most people would in five lifetimes. 

But this is the dangerous thing about Q, because he presses his lips together and looks into Bond's eyes as if he sees something there, and then he's touching Bond with those pianist's hands, stroking up his arm to his shoulder with one, taking hold of his elbow with the other. It's like a father comforting a child, one that's grown bigger and broader than himself. Bond feels closer to crawling back into the bottom of a whisky bottle than he has done in months.

“You should go to medical. Talk to someone, get all those bruises seen to.”

He shakes his head in refusal then moves away, Q's hand falling away and back to his side. “Haven't slept in awhile. I should probably . . .”

“If that's what you think's best.”

The earnest tone that Q's adopting with him makes Bond chuckle, leaning his head back and breathing in deep, trying to expel some of the heavy air clogging his throat. “No, that's not what I think is best, but it'll have to do.”

“What's best?” It's said warily, as if Q's got an idea of what's coming, and Bond's not one to disappoint if he can help it. 

“Stripping you naked, then draining you of each and every drop of seminal fluid currently collected in your fuzzy little ballsack.”

He hopes that saying the words aloud has affected Q as much as it has him, his skin starting to throb all over as his blood swarms to heat and fill his prick. He and Q stare at each other, not saying a word as he watches Q's head making a million calculations per second, the tip of Q's tongue unconsciously wetting his bottom lip before he answers. 

“Shit. Fuck it, alright. But not here.”

“Just turn off the security feed.” He moves to stand closer to Q again, enough that Q's shoulder is against his chest. “I can't imagine that'd take someone like you more than three keystrokes.”

“Someone like me? Would that be, theoretically speaking, a division head in her Majesty's secret intelligence service, and someone in the most pants-shittingly responsible job he's ever had and is ever likely to have?” 

Bond concedes the point, which is only fair. “Possibly.” 

“We're not doing a bloody thing in my office.” Q's cheeks are dusted with red, his eyes huge and dark behind his glasses, his mouth wet. He looks horny as hell, and it takes all of Bond's remaining self-control not to jump on him here and start ripping off the horrible cardigan. “Go back to my place to get some sleep while I finish up here. I'd offer you the keys, but you've already proven they're unnecessary.”

That'd been a good night. Bond feels himself smiling in a way he's not done all week as he makes to take his leave. But he turns back towards Q and grabs Q's arm to tug him close for the second it takes him to mutter “I'm going to fuck you raw once you get home. Enjoy your afternoon. I'm sure it'll be productive.”

~*~

“Hello? You here? Yes, Clive, I see you but, you know what, mate? You're going to have to be patient.” There's a muffled thud, a curse, the discordant crash of keys being tossed on the kitchen counter. “Maybe you'll understand when you're older and start wanting to fertilise the eggs of all those hot gecko ladies you're always looking up online. Yeah, don't think I'm not onto you. Word to the wise – clear your history once in a while, you filthy bugger.”

Bond's woken up a second before he hears the jangle of Q's keys in his door, heart pounding at the base of his throat before he figures out where he is and his well-honed fight-or-flight instinct starts to calm down. He's sprawled across the entirety of Q's bed on his belly, naked under an inappropriately flowery blue duvet he's already mocked a few times. He feels like he could carry on sleeping for about another month or two if nobody disturbed him. He pushes himself upwards, rolling into a sitting position and rubbing over his face with both hands before calling out, “In here.”

The day's disappeared, the room black with the only light coming from an orange streetlight outside Q's bedroom window that's not entirely blocked out by the blind. The bedroom door opens a crack, a tousled head appearing around from behind it as Bond winces into the crack of brighter light spilling into the room from behind Q's figure. 

“You slept.”

“I did.” Even with that thing creeping through its plastic foliage chomping on bugs next door. 

“Tea? Coffee?” 

He shakes his head, scratching along the back of his neck with one hand, and Q stares at his armpit then swallows.

“You eaten?”

“I'm planning to.”

“Ah.” Q makes a thoughtful face, and the light shining off his hair from behind turns it into a bird's nest, a halo framing his peculiar beauty, making him look like something out of an illustration in a medieval bible. “Does that mean it's time for all the raw fucking?”

“If that's what you want. I'm open to suggestions.”

Bond sits up to kneel in the bed with his knees wide, pushing the duvet away to show his cock hardening and beginning to lift. For too many years his body's been his tool and he's treated it like shit, allowing it to be beaten and bruised beyond the point of being able to entirely heal. It gets the job done, most of the time, and he's grown to respect it in a detached sort of way, the same way he'd admire a handgun that doesn't stick, or a knife that holds its edge no matter what you put it through. He knows and honours his body's limits more than he used to, and tries to bear the boredom necessary to give it time to recuperate when it needs it. But his body's a tool, part-owned, part-invested in. It's not him. 

The way Q looks at his body connects him to it in a way he's seldom experienced. Watching Q staring at his nakedness in something approaching awe, while starting to strip out of his clothes as he stumbles over toeing out of his shoes, makes Bond feel as if he's his body and nothing else, blood pumping, skin heating, nerves preparing to spark. He's close to fully hard when Q hits the bed, a hand reaching and taking him to slide his foreskin the rest of the way back. He fucks into it with a hum of satisfaction, then reaches out, using both hands to relieve Q of his glasses. 

“Careful with –”

“I'm putting them right here by the bed . . .”

“Yes, but –”

“The things I have to do to shut you up.” 

Q's fingers tighten around him reflexively with the first kiss. Bond grunts, and feels Q's wide mouth stretching out into a grin against his, and his cock's throbbing hot and greedy where Q's clever hand is twisting around its tip. Q's damp hair coils around his fingers as Bond slides them into place around Q's skull, using the strength in his hands to guide the mouth against his deeper into the kiss for a second.

“You're wet.”

“It's drizzling out.”

Q smells of this morning's shampoo, damp wool, his breath scented with his last cup of tea before he left work. He's cupping Bond's balls with one hand, rubbing his thumb over them back and forth, his fingers sliding around the mixed-up nerves of the scar until Bond's ready to bite his tongue in two. Instead he starts biting at Q's mouth, swallowing the annoyed protest Q squawks against his lips when he tears Q's shirt open after first disposing of his tie. But anything else would've taken too long and this is what he's after, the skin beneath, as pale as milk, softer than silk velvet over Q's ribs and into his armpits, flecked with slight texture elsewhere, as if he could read Q with his fingertips alone. He dips his head to nip at Q's small, tight nipple, sucking it over his teeth, and Q lets go of his dick. Fingers cradle Bond's head to hold him close as Q moans, his voice cracked with need.

“Oh, you total bastard, why do you have to be so good at this?”

“Practice makes perfect.” He nips harder, wanting to bruise, and it makes Q hiss and push him away. 

“Yet the buttons on my shirt were too much of a challenge.”

“They were in my way. As are your trousers, so, if you're fond of them . . .”

Maybe this is what he likes about Q. Bond's so used to fucking elegance, and to fucking those who know poise is their birthright because they're beautiful and have no cause to be needy, or to give anything away other than a sense that they are as skilled and as worthy of his attention as any of the other lonely, emotionally-numb women he's screwed. They'd look at him and, as broken and beat-up as he is, they'd know he was the same as them, and that nothing mattered but chasing the itch long enough to relieve it with a quick scratch.

Q's not poised. Bond has very little idea if Q's lonely or if he's one of the very few SIS employees who manage to have an active, fun-filled social life, but he knows Q's nowhere close to being emotionally numb. Q's hands are trembling as he's trying to undo his belt in too much of a hurry. He looks older without his glasses, less of a beguiling sprite, now a skinny over-grown boy hyperventilating with lust as his rain-curled hair falls into his eyes. He's needy, and gawky, nothing at all like Bond, who's not sure if he's ever wanted to pin anyone down and make them come till they're screaming more than he does right now. 

Q throws his trousers off the bed, shimmying out of his underwear as his prick bounces on his concave belly, then tugs his socks off one by one. 

“Can't do it with my socks on. Never could.”

“Fine with me.” 

He grabs one of Q's de-socked feet, pulling it up to his face so he can press his teeth into the arch. He almost gets his nose kicked off his face for it, catching the foot and holding it firm just in time. 

“Watch it.”

“It tickled. Your stubble . . . sorry.”

“You don't think I've got enough people in my life trying to break my nose? Trust me, pretty like this doesn't happen without it being a group effort.”

“I think you're pretty.” Q's shifted across the bed to sit up against him, and Bond starts to kiss and nibble his way around a neck that was clean-shaven this morning, but his face is gently taken in two hands that tug him up until he's looking into Q's eyes, which in the dark seem to dominate the finely-boned face. “Old and knackered, but pretty.”

“And when was the last time you had your eyes checked?”

“What, it doesn't say in my file?”

The smile bubbles up from somewhere inside of Bond like a hidden spring. “I didn't have the time to memorise it in entirety.”

His hands have been busy, aligning them both so he can start to fuck against Q's cock, his fingers stroking down between Q's bum cheeks. There's not actually that much hair on Q's body, but these days he's so used to everything being plucked and shaved into extinction that it was strange at first, his preferences derailing and slowly learning to run on new tracks. It's a definite turn-on now, parting Q's cheeks with a finger that trails down through the fine fuzz to locate and rub over Q's arsehole, and Q shudders, his prick pulsing softly against Bond's.

“I need to say something –”

“Why am I not surprised?” 

Q's thrusting against him harder, his finger circling Bond's nipple in an aggravating tease that never touches where it needs to.

“– I want you to fuck me, but I don't want you to start thinking that's what I always want. Because that's not the case and I don't. Not always.”

“But it's okay tonight.” Bond rubs harder, working his fingertip inside as he sucks at Q's neck hard enough to mark. Q makes a choking sound and drops his head against Bond's shoulder, breathing hard.

“I think we can safely agree on that, at least.”

“If you're a good boy and do as you're told for once, I might let you fuck me one day. If you want.”

He twists his dry fingertip at the entrance of Q's pucker, and Q swears into his neck, his body shivering against Bond's. “I'll look like a greyhound shagging a pitbull.”

“Is that a yes?”

“Of course it's a yes, and stop asking me questions. I'm busy.”

“You look it.” He drags his hands away, slapping Q on one small, firm buttock before pushing him face down into the pillows. “If you want me to stop talking, spread your legs.”

It's probably just as well it's dark and he can't see much. The way Q ducks his head into the pillows and pushes his legs apart, arching his back so his pert little bottom's sitting up and begging, makes Bond want to forget how he's been imagining between naps all day how he'll slowly reduce Q to a begging, whimpering nerve-end before any actual fucking of note takes place. As it is, the low-light view of Q's slim thighs spread wide, the tidy package of his balls and the defenceless curve of his neck and spine where his head's buried in the bed, means that Bond's already mentally halving the amount of effort he's likely to be able to expend before he needs to be pushing his way inside all the scornful intensity laid out in front of him.

It won't be the first arse he's fucked by any means, but it'll be the first for a long time, just as it's been a good few years since he's done this as anything other than a brief detour from cunnilingus. Q's arse cheeks each make a neat handful as Bond moves to lie on his stomach between Q's legs. The weight of his body presses his erection into the bed, and he fucks against the duvet a few times as he noses his way into Q's bum, smiling into it at the harsh intake of breath coming from the bedhead. 

“Ooh, bugger.”

“Not quite yet.”

“What happened to not talking? Oh, fu-huck.”

He's too turned-on to waste time teasing. Bond pulls Q's cheeks apart as far as he can without causing too much discomfort, and licks heavily from Q's balls all the way to the top of his arse crack, making sure to swipe his tongue in a lazy zigzag over Q's hole. Q tastes faintly of the scent of the hand soap in the gents at HQ. Although the taste of a full day at work then a crowded commute home isn't something Bond would baulk at because, God knows, he's eaten worse, the consideration and attention to every last detail is so typically Q that it pokes at a sentimental spot inside of him. One he ignores.

Anyway, there's also the mental image of Q going into the bathrooms after work to consider, carefully washing himself while thinking of this, and Bond feels his dick throb hotter and more insistent against the bed as he considers exactly that. He pushes his face into Q's crack deeper, starting to tongue at Q's arsehole as mercilessly as his cock wants him to, his thumbs digging into each cheek until Q's moaning and shifting his hips beneath Bond's mouth. There's few things that appeal to Bond more than a responsive bed partner, and Q's one of the more active as Bond continues to tongue-fuck his way into Q's body. Q's gasping, swearing loudly, hiking his arse upward and first pleading for then demanding more. 

“Oh, Christ, stick something in there. Unh, no, not your tongue, fingers or cock.”

“Lube?” He murmurs it against Q's hole, which spasms and tightens in on itself.

“Bedside table. Top drawer. In the back suhh, ahh fuck,” Q pushes back against another heavy lick, “Somewhere. Condoms, too.”

Maybe that defines the difference between them more than anything else. If it were down to him, he wouldn't bother. Not because he believes he's indestructible, or that STDs are something that happen to someone else. Bond can't bring himself to think it'd be that much of a catastrophe if he caught something. He's at the limit of life-expectancy for a double-oh as it is. He's used every one of his nine lives, and more besides, and he'd be dead long before any sickness took hold. The next bullet or next fall is likely to be the last. That's pragmatism speaking, not pessimism. 

But Q's young, and nowhere near at the top of his game. It reminds Bond that these things are important to most people. The continuation of life, and all that. All the sort of thing he fights for instead of engaging with the issues personally. Not anymore, if he can help it. He closes his eyes and rests his forehead against one of Q's bum cheeks for the split second it takes him to dismiss the thought, breathing in the wet, ready scent of him, then reaches out to find everything required. 

“Take your time, why don't you? No rush, 007.”

Bond looks up from where he's blindly digging through a drawer full of empty Pro-Plus sheets, sticky bottles of cough syrup, and discarded ear buds that have knitted themselves into tangled messes with various computer leads. Q's glaring at him over one shoulder, his eyes endlessly dark beneath the drawn-down brows and thick fringe of drying hair, his Adam's apple digging a notch in his neck. 

“A pressing appointment you need to get to?” He flicks on the bedside lamp to help in his search, and Q huffs, shielding his eyes. 

“No, no appointment. Feel free to blind me at your leisure.”

“Do you ever stop complaining?”

“No.” Q's sudden grin makes Bond's dick bob and his stomach flip. “Hurry the fuck up, you old fart.”

The little shit deserves the lubed finger that's pushed in hard and fast, and Q hisses into the pillow, his hands flexing on the sheets as Bond twists the finger and feels all the muscles in Q's bum tightening around him. He can't quite imagine the bliss of all that around his cock, but his cock tries to for him, hardening further and throbbing ever more imperatively. The need to get inside the slim, pale body is heightened now that the light's on, Bond's arousal growing to the point where his throat aches from reining it in, because he can already see in his mind how perfectly he'll fit over that body, how the slender limbs have enough lean muscle in them to take his weight, how the perfectly-formed bum has just enough flesh on it to cushion his thrusts. 

“Put this on me.” He uses his free hand to toss the condom across to Q, who shifts over to take Bond's prick in hand, his thumb playing in the line of pre-cum that's drooling down the entire length of it. “And careful – that's fully armed.”

Q's wavering expression, which is changing from pleased to drugged to aroused as Bond shifts his finger around then slowly pushes in another, turns more diabolical, an imp ready to cause some lasting damage. “Count to ten then run?” 

“Ten might be pushing it.” 

“Then I suppose we'd better deploy it as soon as possible.” 

Although he's sure he'll be lucky if he makes it halfway in before it's game over, Bond draws on his infamous control to set his needs aside long enough to get the job done, positioning himself, hands on slim hips, delineating the crease between Q's bum cheeks with his dick as he draws back ready to slip down and shove in. He concentrates on the tremors running down the crenelated rope of spine stretching out from the small of Q's back. On the shivery gasp from up near the bedhead, which occurs on the edge of his hearing as his cock finds the dimple of Q's arsehole and begins to push. He concentrates on the way Q snarls and puffs out a breath, pushing back and starting to open like the tightest, sweetest rosebud on the cusp of blossoming. Then he's in, just the tip, and it's tight, fuck, too tight, snapping around him like a rubber band. 

“. . . Pardon? Didn't hear.” Q'd said something but Bond doesn't hear it, eyes screwed so tightly closed in effort that red and purple stars spark behind his eyelids. 

“I said, just a fucking minute, because I can't manage your sodding big horse cock all in one go.”

It surprises a laugh out of him, which makes Q laugh, but that makes stuff move and contract, and they both sober up fast, Q giving a moan and pushing himself down a millimetre more onto Bond's prick as Bond bites the inside of his cheek and digs his fingers into Q's hips. Bond's keeping his breathing as shallow as possible, depriving the muscles involved of the oxygen needed to do anything drastic like come too soon. But they start to rock together, minuscule movements that drive Bond's dick by small increments inward until it's buried in a wet, clenching mass of extraordinary sensation.

“Christ, I'm sweating, and we haven't even moved.”

“What?” Bond's not sure he hears it again, too caught up as he is in how tightly Q is enveloping him, tiny muscle movements rippling over the surface of his hard-on, and how in comparison to the snug fit Q's providing, his prick feels like it's about the size of his leg.

“Oh, God. I'm going to have to make you a hearing aid next, aren't I?”

“That's enough of that.” He pulls out an inch and drives back in immediately, his libido raging at him to start hammering away as hard and fast as he can. “I'm going to fuck all that cheek right out of you.”

Q snorts, his head a tumble of dark curls what seems like a million miles away, his fingers splayed across his hair. “Promises, promises.”

So he starts. Slowly at first, opening the body beneath him up, a grind more than a fuck as he leans his weight into Q's arse and circles his hips, reaching down along Q's body to take a firm hold of one shoulder. Then Bond lifts his hips and begins to pump faster, bouncing Q back onto him until all he can hear is Q's steadily-chanted _'Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck...'_ in time with each thrust. He was already on a short fuse, so again Bond has to remove himself from the equation, instead focussing on Q, attending to the needs of the body that's accommodating him so beautifully. 

He pulls Q up to rest against his chest as he fucks up into him, wishing there was a mirror in here somewhere. Women always have a mirror in their bedrooms. There's nowhere for him to see how good Q looks stretched back against him, pale against tan, tender skin against scars, his thick, dark cock rising up out of his coiling black bush as Bond strokes him back into hardness. Q's head falls forward every five thrusts with a moan, and Bond gives in to instinct, biting his way across the back of Q's neck as his hand speeds up around Q's dick while strong, slender fingers grab hold of his thighs. He'd known all along that Q was never going to be a passive or motionless screw, but now he's reduced to an anchor as Q starts to ride him, lean muscle straining in his arms as he fucks himself hard and deep on Bond's prick. Bond tries to match his rhythm, his heart speeding and his lungs burning like he's trying to sprint up the highest slopes of a mountain.

“Harder.” It's a snarl, imperious and arrogant. “Fuck me like you mean it.”

He wraps his other arm around Q and reaches up, taking the front of Q's long throat in one hand under his jaw like he's about to push back with one swift movement to snap his neck, and he nips at Q's skin beneath his ear. “I bet you were the sort of boy who threw stones at the lions in the zoo.”

“Zoos are for the intellectually normative, and, fucking shitting sodding _Christ_ , I'm going to come if you keep wanking me off that fast.”

“About bloody time.” Bond can already feel a telltale muscular flutter around his prick, and Q's arsehole continues to tighten around him as he starts bouncing Q in his lap, skin smacking skin and neat fingernails digging into his thighs as he gives free rein to the itch trying its damnest to start building deep inside his balls. “Spread your legs wider. I can take your weight.”

He's going to come. Nothing can stop it now, a throb deep inside his arsehole and at the base of his pounding, aching cock signalling his readiness, but Q twists backwards, long neck stretched out vulnerably beneath Bond's hand, dark eyes heavy-lidded before they look into Bond's. Then Q closes his eyes, gives one long, quavering moan, and lays the side of his forehead against Bond's as he starts to ejaculate over Bond's fingers. 

Bond's own climax is climbing in an uncontrolled upward spiral, ready to beat the shit out of him, but the connection caused by Q's sweat-damp forehead leaned against his, a circuit completed, punches through the dense inward focus of a mind and body working together to catapult him into the stratosphere. Almost as he's cresting, Bond instantly becomes profoundly aware of the shuddering, cursing body held across his own. The damp dark curls clinging to his own forehead, the pulse beating wildly beneath the skin pressed against his. The thorough and absolute surrender, the trust, and the faith placed in him by someone who's barely able to surrender the conversational upper hand where the intrinsic value of a cup of tea's involved. He chokes into Q's neck, eyes filling with stinging, inexplicable tears, and starts to come so hard that his thighs lift them over and face-down onto the bed into a convulsing sprawl.

“Fucking ow. I think I just remembered why I don't do that very often.”

“We can't do this again.” His voice sounds like it's coming from a long way away, crackly like an old tannoy system. He's shaking all over, panic rushing through him like wildfire, the over-familiar taste of an adrenaline surge coating his tongue in bitterness. 

“Eh? What're you on about now?”

“This. Us. Whatever this is, it's done. Sorry.”

“Sorry?” Q's surprised, cum-happy, sleepy chuckle teases little jolts of sensation up and down Bond's prick, each one poking him towards over-sensitivity. “You're seriously telling me you don't want to fuck me again, while your dick is still firmly wedged up my fucking arse?”

The glaring white light of orgasm's clearing now, so Bond pulls out with a grunt, breathing away the panic, getting everything back under control where it belongs as he pulls the condom off to knot it. He's not going down this road again, and he won't look at Q because that unpolished, other-worldly not-beautiful beauty sprawled in post-coital disarray might be his undoing. If his work's taught him nothing else, Bond knows his limits. 

“That's right. I've taken this too far.” He breathes, in and out, gets his pulse back under control. Locates the torn condom foil in the mess of bedding and tucks the used rubber inside, feeling his clinical detachment beginning to reassert itself because thoughts of how poisonous he is, and how the people he lets himself get close to die one by one by one like green bottles on a wall, won't help a damn thing. “My fault. Won't let it happen again.

Q laughs, but the humour's gone out of it, his voice still somewhat breathy but as flatly bitchy as it's ever been. “I think I can promise you that the likelihood of this happening again anytime soon isn't something you need to worry about.”

The sheet shifts beneath Bond's knees as Q pulls the bedding up over himself, turning over onto his back. Bond can feel Q looking at him, hell, he can almost hear the cogs ticking over inside Q's head, but he can't respond, and he won't. He dresses in silence, nerves fizzling under his touch as he's still not far enough away from a climax that lifted him off his knees, and he doesn't look at Q until he's checked his pockets for phone, cash, the foil-wrapped rubber that he'll bury in the kitchen bin on his way out. But now he's done, and he meets Q's eyes without a flinch, even though they're the colour of storm clouds mixed with dirty, healing bruise. 

“I am sorry. Maybe you'll understand –”

“There's nothing to understand, and I'm going to sleep.” Q flumps down in the bed, pulling the duvet up over one skinny pale shoulder as he turns on his side and switches off his bedside light. “Good night, 007. Put the door on the latch on your way out.”

So he does, because sometimes he's very good at following orders.


End file.
